


Your Brother's Ghost

by I_Got_Lost



Category: Storm Hawks (Cartoon)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Dark Ace is one bad dude, Murder, No redemption, Nostalgia, Not A Fix-It, POV Dark Ace, POV Second Person, Plotting Murder, anger issues, discussion of past murder, the tags make this seem really dark
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-05
Updated: 2020-10-05
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:48:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,229
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26845417
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/I_Got_Lost/pseuds/I_Got_Lost
Summary: "You sit on the cliff of a terra too small to be named and in the distance, you see the Condor fly off into the clouds. You watch the Condor fly off and part of you, a part so small you thought it had been crushed years before, aches that you’re not on that ship."
Comments: 3
Kudos: 13





	Your Brother's Ghost

**Author's Note:**

> First off, this fic is based on two head cannons I had about this show.  
> 1\. The Dark Ace considered Aerrow's father to be his brother.  
> 2\. The Dark Ace knows Aerrow is related to his dead 'brother' and in fact, was the one to drop Aerrow off at the orphanage.  
> Second, this fic has been bothering me for years, and I finally got annoyed enough to pen it and post it.  
> Third, as always, have fun, enjoy, and please don't shoot me.  
> -Lost

You sit on the cliff of a terra too small to be named and in the distance, you see the Condor fly off into the clouds. You watch the Condor fly off and part of you, a part so small you thought it had been crushed years before, aches that you’re not on that ship.

You’re not on that ship. You sent that ship down to the wastes. You crashed it, you watched it burn. (Obviously, you didn’t watch it enough.) But you watched it burn. You saw it go down and, morbidly, you wonder who took your bunk? Who took your bunk? Who took the little hole in the wall bed that you insisted be installed because you couldn’t stand sharing a room with your brother (not in blood, never in blood. But god, you can still see it. The blood. Its under your nails and on your wrists, and gods, for such a warm man, his blood had cooled so quickly.)

Who took your bunk?

Was it him?

The kid?

The Sky-Knight?

(God, you want to lean over and hurl. A sky-knight. A relic. For such a young boy he learned his history well.)

But gods, that first time. That first fight. It was like looking at a ghost. It was like looking over and seeing your baby brother rising out of the sky and grinning that cocky little grin and FREE FALLING exactly like your brother used to. It was like watching that cocky son-of-a-bitch dropping down into a swan dive and gods, it took everything you had not to kick off and haul the boy back. Haul him back and smack his head and tell him to smarten up before the ground clipped his wings forever.

It took everything you had not to call out to the boy and the worst part, the absolute worst part? He doesn’t even know.

This little boy, this little boy you chucked off the Condor and stuck in an orphanage. This little boy you couldn’t kill but also couldn’t keep with you. This little boy, who has none of the training, none of the finesse of your brother, but has all of the instinct and the brashness. This little boy who is rough and unpolished but has so much potential.

And you look at him, and you want him dead.

But you can’t kill him.

You can’t.

Because who else can stand against you? Who else can challenge you? The boy isn’t soft, he honestly walks into the duels expecting you to die, but God, it's like fighting a ghost. He moves so much like his father but punches so much like you. And at some point, it becomes less about seeing your brother and looking at him and seeing a mirror.

He’s his daddy but good lord, he’s all you. This boy has never known the golden age and you see it in every move he makes that his father would have spit at. His father, stuck in his morals and wound up so tight he couldn’t see the grey through his lens of black and white. But this boy, this boy _never_ uses his crystals more then he has too. His daddy took pot-shots like he had ammo to spare. The boy uses punches as if every shot was his last and there are no more crystals coming.

You look at this little boy and you see ghosts. _Morals wont save you_ , you want to shout. _Morals will make you soft_. But the boy steps over each punch like they're bumps in the roads instead of cliffs.

This is a boy with loose morals and the knowledge that every shot he takes could kill someone, and unlike his daddy, he pulls that trigger anyway. He’s a good little soldier and you lean forward and you scream at him. You let loose the rage and the pain and the anger, because you can see _him_. You see him. Your brother.

(You see yourself.)

Here’s a little boy who is so much like you. Who clawed his way up from wreckage and takes every single slap with nothing more then a dedication to keep moving. Here’s a little soldier boy who just keeps marching. And you watch. Because surely he is his daddy's son. Someone is going to stab him in the back. Someone is going to kill him.

But no one ever does.

He can’t do motivational speeches to save his life. He doesn't talk if a punch can get him the same thing and dear lord, he’s you. And you watch. And you watch. And lord, he’s going to kill someone. He is going to take the plunge and realize that the only way to make it through this world is to put a crystal in his brother’s back and keep on marching. (You did. So he must too.) But he doesn’t. He never does.

And he gets quicker.

He gets smarter.

He becomes more then you ever were and suddenly, you feel old. You're an old man playing a young man’s game and God, his daddy would have been 46 this year and his son isn’t even 20 yet.

His daddy would have been so proud and you hate this. You hate this boy and the ghosts he wears and you wonder. You wonder. He doesn’t shout at you. He doesn't rage. You killed them. You killed his daddy and God, shouldn’t he come at you with the same rage you went at his father? But he doesn’t. He never does. And you want to tell him. You want to ask him. Does he know? Does he know you killed them? And you almost do, but then…

But then…

An awful thought.

Does it matter? Does he care you killed his daddy? His father was another notch in your wing, a cut to gloat over. But there is no one left to gloat to. His son doesn't care. Your nephew is a soldier boy, quick with a gun and faster with his wings, and God. One day. One day you’re going to be a notch in his wings. And the boy wont even care.

And you sit there, on the terra too small to even name, and you watch. You watch the boy who carries ghosts in his blood and wraiths in his name, and you wonder. His daddy was a Storm Hawk. But you always thought the name never fit. His daddy always dove first, shot first, and clipped wings last. But him? The boy? He dives last in the game of chicken, he shoots last, even when his ammo is stocked, and he clips wings first.

His daddy never seemed to understand that hawks were the fiercest things out there and lord help whoever got in their sight. But the boy? The boy doesn’t seem to care. He’s got eyes that see too much and knives that cut harder then crystals.

His daddy wasn’t a Storm Hawk, but the boy certainly is.

You sit on that terra and you think. You made a lot of mistakes over the course of your life. Giving that boy away was certainly one of them. And next time? Next time you see that boy, you’re going to put a knife in his back and your fingers around his throat, just like you should have all those years ago.


End file.
